States like South Australia and Victoria have announced plans for road-user fees for electric vehicles, which the governments in those jurisdictions say is necessary to provide funding for road maintenance.

But Greens spokeswoman on transport issues say the taxes serve as a disincentive to people who would otherwise invest in the vehicles and lower their carbon emissions.

Under the bill proposed by the Greens, states would have to pay the amount collected under the taxes back to the federal government, with the money then redistributed among states and territories without such taxes.

Victoria expects to collect $30 million per year through its charges on electric and hydrogen-fuelled vehicles.

Senator Rice was not optimistic of gaining support from Labor or the Coalition on the bill, and said the lack of support showed the government wasn't acting on its "technology not taxes" approach to action on climate change.

"We want to send the message to state governments that putting a brake on the growth of electric vehicles is not acceptable, while rewarding states that do the right thing," she said.

"This bill will neutralise any EV tax raised by a state government. This will give electric vehicle owners some hope that they won't be unfairly hit by road user charges by state governments."

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On Sunday the NSW government announced it would remove stamp duty charges for electric vehicles, in a bid to encourage their take up.

The state is set to introduce a road user tax for electric vehicles, but not until they reach 30 per cent of new car sales. Senator Rice said this approach was better and would allow the industry to gain a foothold before taxes were introduced.

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